Little Love Affair (Southern Romance Series, #1) Read Free

said desperately. “And bandages. Clean bandages. We’ve used everything we have.”
    “We?” Clara seized on the word.
    “My...friend...and I. I beg you—” He broke off and looked away. “I’d never take charity for myself, miss. I’d not ask, but my friend’s wounded. He’ll never make it back to his family if I can’t bind his arm.”
    Clara was shaking. “A lot of people aren’t going to make it back to their families.” She wanted her voice to be harsh, to remind him of everything his kind had done, but all she could think of was Solomon lying wounded and dying, and she knew she sounded lost.
    “I know.” His eyes said that he did know. They spoke so much pain that she looked away from him. “But he still could make it back, don’t you see?” His voice was low, pleading. “I’ve no one to go back to, but he does: a sister, he said. Like you, miss. A sister who’s waiting for him to come home.”
    “Stop,” Clara whispered, shaking her head. I can’t help you. Not you.
    “Please,” he said again. Just one word, nothing more. His hands were still up, his eyes full of pain, and Clara could feel herself crumbling inside. God help her, she wanted to tell him that she would help. What was it about this man? Were all Confederate soldiers so charming?
    “Clara?” A call echoed in the fields, and Clara looked over her shoulder desperately. Footsteps were approaching.
    It was Cecelia that made up her mind: Cecelia, sixteen and perfectly pretty.
    “Get off my property.” She made her voice as hard as she could.
    “I promise, I won’t hurt—”
    “Go!” Clara stepped forward, desperate to drive him away before he could see Cecelia again, before he could hurt one of them, or have a chance to steal her sister away from her. “Go, or I’ll call the constables! I’ll call them anyway! Go!”
    “Miss, he’s going to die. ” The man pressed his palms together, beseeching.
    “And he should!” Clara yelled back at last. “He has a sister? Well, I had a brother, and you’re the reason my brother’s not coming home! You and your friend! Go! Go, or I’ll kill you myself! Just leave!” She could hardly see for the tears, but when she opened her eyes at last, he was gone and Cecelia’s arms were around her.
    “Clara!”
    “Child?” Their mother’s voice. Millicent, still in the same grey dress she had worn since her husband’s death, was holding Solomon’s rifle. Her eyes, the same blue as Clara’s, measured the girl’s tears.
    “He’s gone. I told him I’d send the constables after him.” Clara tried to keep the sob from her voice, and failed.
    “You’re so brave,” Cecelia whispered. “Come home now. We’ll send someone into town.”
    “No need,” their mother said briskly. She nodded for her daughters to precede her back through the fields. “They’ll run off, if they have any sense at all. And mind the wheat, girls, that’s the harvest you’re trampling.”
    “Mother...”
    “She’s right,” Clara told her sister softly. She wiped tears away from her eyes and tried to smile over at Cecelia. “You shouldn’t have come back. It wasn’t safe.”
    She expected a retort, but Cecelia only looked down at the ground.
    “Cee? What is it?”
    “I thought...” Cecelia looked away. “I know it’s foolish, you don’t have to tell me...the other one has blond hair, Clara. I saw him in the trees and I thought for a moment...I thought...”
    “You thought Solomon had come back,” Clara whispered. She could hardly speak for the lump in her throat.
    “Then I saw it wasn’t him. I shouldn’t have screamed,” Cecelia said so earnestly as they walked through the doorway of the farmhouse. “The other one...his whole sleeve was bloody. They wouldn’t have hurt me. Clara, I’m so sorry.”
    “You did the right thing,” Clara said simply. She tried to smile. I thought Solomon had come back. “You should go brush your hair out.”
    “You need to, too,” Cecelia said,